Minimally invasive neuronavigator-guided microsurgery and photodynamic therapy for gliomas.

In order to evaluate the effectiveness of neuronavigator-guided microsurgery and keyhole technique for the resection of gliomas, a total of 60 patients with gliomas were exactly located by using neuronavigator during microsurgery. Forty deep-seated gliomas were resected through a keyhole operative approach. Thirty out of the 60 cases were subjected to photodynamic therapy (PDT) after tumor resection. The therapeutic effectiveness of all the cases was recorded and analyzed. The results showed that glioma was totally resected in 52 cases (86.7%), subtotally in 5 (8.3%), and most partially in 3 (5%). Neurological deficits occurred postoperatively in 4 cases. One patient died of multiple system organ failure 4 days after operation. It was concluded that the application of minimally invasive technique could dramatically decrease surgical complications following resection of glioma, and its combination with PDT could obviously improve the quality of life of patients and prolong the survival time.